


a good cleric

by Prim_the_Amazing



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-02
Updated: 2019-01-02
Packaged: 2019-10-03 00:58:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,674
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17274104
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Prim_the_Amazing/pseuds/Prim_the_Amazing
Summary: Caleb gets smacked by the monster twelve feet through the air and then drags and rolls for eight more across the dirt. He groans, but doesn’t get back up.“Shit!” Beau swears.“Caleb!” Nott cries.Jester sets the monster on holy fire with an enthusiastic roar, ignoring Caleb lying prone beside her only five feet away.It looks like it’s Caduceus’ turn to heal their friends. Again.He doesn’t mind.





	a good cleric

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: Caduceus & Jester, bonding over different ways to be a cleric, and different gods.
> 
> Hope you like it, @dreamsofjianghu!

Caleb gets smacked by the monster twelve feet through the air and then drags and rolls for eight more across the dirt. He groans, but doesn’t get back up. 

“Shit!” Beau swears. 

“Caleb!” Nott cries. 

Jester sets the monster on holy fire with an enthusiastic roar, ignoring Caleb lying prone beside her only five feet away. 

It looks like it’s Caduceus’ turn to heal their friends. Again. 

He doesn’t mind. 

 

Their group happens upon a shrine to the Wild Mother. It’s not as grand as the lighthouse in Nicodranas by far, but he still stops to clean it up, light incense, help the plants growing around it. The group doesn’t protest or seem bothered, content to take a short rest while he goes through the comforting motions of faith and maintenance. 

As he prays, he can tell that Jester’s looking at him without opening his eyes. He hears the quiet shifting of fabric and opens his eyes to see her with her arm outstretched towards the little statuette of the Wild Mother, paint brush in hand. She freezes in front of him. 

“No,” he says, gently but firmly taking hold of her wrist and pushing it down and away from the statuette. 

“I wasn’t going to do anything bad!” she says, perfectly earnest. “I was just going to play a little itty bitty prank is all, it was going to be soooo funny.” 

“Still no,” he says. 

“It would’ve been funny! I would’ve laughed, the Traveler would’ve laughed, you would’ve laughed, I bet even _ she,” _ she gestures empathetically at the statuette with the hand holding the paintbrush, splattering it with drops of paint, “would’ve crapped herself laughing, Caduceus.” 

He picks back up the rag he’d been using earlier and starts rubbing the flecks of paint away before they dry. 

She pouts. “Don’t do that.” 

“Do what?” 

“Make me feel  _ stupid _ and _ rude.”  _

“I didn’t say anything,” he says. “If you feel that, you’re the only one making you feel it. Perhaps it’s for a reason?” 

She contrives to pout  _ more.  _

“The Wild Mother isn’t a goddess of mischief like yours, Jester. Her domain is over the wilderness and the sea.” 

“Sooo, what you’re saying is that she doesn’t have a sense of humor. That she’s a stinky poo poo frowny boring pants.” 

“I wouldn’t describe her like that,” he says, and smiles, because he knows not a drop of this is malice. Also at remembering his one true interaction with Melora. It had been in a dream. Everything had glowed with a beautiful, unreal light. “Not that I’ve talked to her much. We don’t get together for chats as often as you and yours.” 

Jester preens. “Yes, well, what we have is pretty special, uh huh.” 

“She’s got too many followers to spare much time for any one of us.” 

The preening falls to a defensive frown. “Yes, well,” she mutters. “The Traveler’s got other followers too. But I’m his  _ favorite,” _ she stresses. 

“That’s nice,” he says. 

“It is,” she agrees, and flops down to doodle sketches in her book while he finishes taking care of the shrine. When he’s done he searches through his pockets one by one. Frowns. Goes through them again, more thoroughly. 

“Here!” Jester says, and he looks up to see her holding out a somewhat stale donut to him. “You’re looking for a gift for her, right? You can use this,  _ everyone _ loves donuts.” 

He looks at it. It’s large. It’s frosted pink. It’s got a bite missing out of it. It’s molding. 

“It’s perfect,” he says, sincerely. “Thank you, Jester.” 

She beams at him as she passes it over. He places it at the foot of the Wild Mother's shrine, on top of the grass. It’s going to decompose into some lovely mulch. She links her arms around his as they walk away, the party trailing behind them. He’s happy for it. His family was a physically affectionate one, and it took him a long time to get used to going so long without touching. It’s a breath of fresh air to go back to linked arms and held hands and having to untangle himself from multiple limbs upon waking. 

“Caduceus, are you mad at me?” she asks suddenly, her voice a little smaller than usual. He looks down at her. Her eyes are big, earnest. 

“No, Jester.” 

“Even though I called your god a stinky poo poo frowny boring pants?” 

Behind them, Fjord chokes. 

“No hard feelings. I don’t think the Wild Mother's feelings are that easily wounded.” 

“Yes, but,” she says, and squirms a bit as they walk, uncomfortable. “But what about  _ your _ feelings?” 

“What’s with the sudden change of mind?” he asks, deflecting. 

“Well, I guess that if she likes donuts then the Wild Mother probably isn’t such a bad god after all, technically.” 

“I think she likes most organic matter. They rot nicely.” 

She wrinkles her nose. “You’re supposed to eat it, Duceus.” 

“How else would the incarnation of nature eat?” 

“I _ guess.” _ She doesn’t look satisfied. He nudges her fondly. 

“I know you were just playing a prank because that’s how you make friends.” Also how she’s sometimes mean towards people, but he can tell the difference between when she’s doing a mean prank and a well intentioned prank. “Maybe the Wild Mother would’ve been amused, maybe not. There’s no one around for miles to clean up her shrine when it gets dirty, though. Who knows how long it’d take before another believer came along to fix it?” 

“Pranks are like a offering,” she says. “It would’ve been cool!” 

“She isn’t a trickster god,” he says. “She prefers things she can eat to things she can chuckle at.” 

“Eating  _ is  _ pretty great,” she concedes. 

“Sure is,” he says, even though that’s something he’d kind of forgotten in the fugue of seasons he’d spend just tending to his shrinking plot of precious land and praying and waiting and praying and  _ waiting.  _ Not that there’d been much to eat anyways. 

 

The white of Beau’s bone disappears behind the flesh that grows to cover it, then skin. She lets out a great relieved sigh, shoulders sagging. “Thanks, Duceus. You’re the man.” 

“It was no problem,” he says, already thinking about how he’s going to make tonight’s rations more palatable. 

She smacks him companionably on the shoulder. He sways forward a bit under the overwhelmingly friendly force of it. “Don’t know what we’d do without you!” 

And then she stalks off to smack someone else on the shoulder too hard or perhaps stare at Yasha intently, and he sees Jester. Beau had probably not seen Jester. 

“Um,” Jester says. 

“She didn’t mean anything by that,” he says, because he knows she didn’t. 

“I’ll just--” she says, and leaves before he can even stand up. He sighs. 

He stands up, cleans away the spell ingredients he’d used to give her some time, and then follows. 

She isn’t crying. Not that that’s good. Sometimes it’s better to get it out. 

“You know she’s just crass,” he says. “Insensitive. Bad with words. She loves you.” 

“Do you think they all think that?” she asks. 

“They all love you.” 

“Caduceus.” And she looks up at him with her big shiny blue eyes. “Am I bad cleric?” 

“No,” he says. 

“Because I don’t really heal people much while we’re fighting, or after we’re fighting, I just let you do it while I do cool, fun stuff like smack people with magical lollipops and  _ am I a bad cleric?”  _

“No.” 

“How do you know!?” 

He takes her hand. She threads their fingers together automatically. He smiles. Jester takes to intimacy instinctually, reflexively. A sign of her mother’s love imprinted on her for all to see in her behavior. It’s beautiful. 

“You gave my god a donut,” he says. 

“It was a moldy donut,” she says, sulky. “I would’ve gotten sick if I’d eaten it.” 

“You gave it to me before I asked for something. It shows thought. Attentiveness. Care.” 

“I called your god mean names and splattered her with paint.” 

“You seem to feel guilty about that.” 

“I thought it’d be funny.” She grimaces. “But it just made me feel bad.” 

He squeezes her hand. It’s very small in his. “You love Beau, don’t you?” 

“Yeah,” she says. 

“Why?” 

“Because she’s really cool and nice and fun and great and stuff,” she rattles off immediately, utterly genuine. 

“Even though she says things that hurt your feelings?” 

“Well, she didn’t mean to! She was just trying to be nice to you.”

“Exactly,” he says. “You were just trying to make people laugh. I know you meant well. You don’t have to dwell on it.” 

A pause, and then, “You’re pretty sneaky, mister Clay.” 

“Why, thank you.” 

“I won’t try and do pranks on your god’s shrines any longer.” 

“I appreciate that.” 

“I’ll still do it to the mean ones though. The ones that say they’re the only ones who get to be worshipped.” 

“Sounds fair to me.” 

He looks at her smile. It’s big and real. 

_ “This  _ is why you’re a good cleric,” he says. 

She blinks at him, startled. “What?” 

“What I’m doing for you now,” he says. “You did it for me on the Mistake, when I was lost and upset when life didn’t go as expected. And you do it for the others too, don’t you?” 

“Sometimes, maybe, technically,” she says, shifting shyly. 

“That’s important,” he says. “Clerics take care of the party. I can be the first one to heal us in battle, and you can be the first one to take care of us when we get sad.” He leans in close to her, as if imparting a secret. “I think you may be better at words than me.” 

“What!” she says, incredulous and happy and flattered. She smacks him on the shoulder, too hard but endearing. “Shut up! Do you really think so?” 

“Yes,” he says. “I really do. You keep on taking care of us, okay?” 

“Only if  _ you _ take care of  _ us.”  _

“It’s a deal, then.” 


End file.
